


Retroactive

by TheHangedMan



Category: Granblue Fantasy (Video Game)
Genre: M/M, Trans Characters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:41:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28136355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheHangedMan/pseuds/TheHangedMan
Summary: “You know,” Belial’s hands twirled as he extinguished a flame in his palm with a theatrical flourish, “Cifer imparted some bit of wisdom to me over a few drinks.” Lucilius paused in his shuffling, suddenly attentive to the serpent’s twisting words. “He told me that he made dear Sandy in the image of the two beings he felt that he was closest to. The two he calls by ‘friend’. I’m sure you understand who I mean by that.”
Relationships: Belial/Lucilius (Granblue Fantasy)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 23





	Retroactive

**Author's Note:**

  * For [min](https://archiveofourown.org/users/min/gifts).



One unsteady step forward, then another.

Dappled sunlight painted the garden’s rough cut stone walkways. His robes trailed behind him as he paced, gathering twigs and dirt, soiling the pure white cloth. Another time he might have been bothered to gather them up around himself, but not today. He was running out of time.

It was up in the branches of a sturdy fig tree that he finally spotted the serpent, reclined against the trunk, biting into the fruit that the tree bore. 

“If you have enough free time to be lazing about like that I must not be giving you enough work to do.” 

A broad grin spread onto his face, “Oh, it’s the opposite actually. I’m all wrung out from how you keep working me. Anymore and I’ll have nothing left in me.” He swung down from the tree and dropped quietly to the ground next to Lucilius.

“Should I be taking notes on your inefficiency?” Lucilius was entirely unamused.

“Mmmm, maybe wait till after tonight when I’ve got you all to myself for awhile.” He leered down from his full towering height. “I think you’ll find I have a very specialized skill set.”

To that comment he offered nothing. A Primarch as complex to design as one that presided over such an abstract concept such as cunning inevitably had to have distasteful quirks. He was decidedly loyal and did his job well, a shame that scrapping him would have been a waste. Still, acknowledging such childish remarks would only result in an increased frequency of future ones. Lucilius let his eyes slip away from Belial to observe what he had been observing just moments ago; a lone primal sitting at the center of the garden. The spare.

“You assured me that you would give me a rebellion by nightfall, why are you here?” The edge was making its way into his voice.

A nonchalant twirl of Belial’s hand brushed the concern aside. “All the pieces are in place, relax Cilius. I’m just making sure all the pawns follow through on their end of the bargain.”

A frustrated sigh escaped Lucilius’ lungs, but he let the issue drop. Despite his unorthodox methods and inability to follow orders to the letter, Belial had never disappointed him on results. There would be a rebellion, of that he had no doubt, but a part of him begrudged the choice of pawn. “When I gave Lucifer free reign to create an angel of his own,” his eyes narrowed in the spare’s direction, “I had expected for him to make something far less… pathetic.” 

“How very rare for you to find any point of dissatisfaction in your most prized creation,” Belial’s crocodile grin greeted him out of the corner of his eye, “even one so slight.” 

The words were flavored with malcontention; Lucilius paid them no mind. “I cannot fathom why he would make a creature so small and feeble. Why does he pay so much attention to something so shoddily put together? Is it an innate drive to nurture… it shouldn’t be. Maybe I should have given him more materials to work with; more room to experiment?” Belial’s expression shifted as if he had taken a bite out a particularly delicious tidbit. His mouth opened, likely to offer a cutting reply, but Lucilius cut him short. “Come, since you have the time, I can use you in my office for some final preparations.”

He didn’t wait for a response.

————————

The room was dark when they arrived. Belial ignited the lamps, flooding the cramped space with light. It was messy— messier than usual; a barely discernible sign of the apocalypse to come. The planning had stretched Lucilius thin. 

“You understand your responsibilities come tomorrow?”

“Yes, yes.” Belial waved him off as he drifted about the roof habitually tidying the space as he went. There wasn’t much of a point to the cleaning, but Lucilius made no move to stop him. “Don’t see why I have to keep an eye on the rebelling angels though, you really don’t put much faith in their ability to kick up a ruckus without me there babysitting. What are you going to do without me when the council comes knocking at your door?”

“I can handle them myself.” He waved his hand over to a single pile of documents situated haphazardly on his office desk. “Dispose of these.”

“As you wish.” Belial seated himself at the desk, taking hold of a sizable stack. After a quick glance, they erupted into violet flames in his hands. 

Lucilius seated himself in turn across from the primal beast and took up a stack himself to sort. Most of it was encrypted, but he couldn’t be too safe. He’d formulated back up plan after back up plan to ensure the success of this operation. All evidence needed to be done away with. Besides there were copies to be had hidden elsewhere.

“Are you really certain there’s nothing else you should be doing right now to ensure that spare doesn’t ruin this?”

“Everything’s already taken care of.” Belial shrugged casually as he kicked his feet up on the table. “You have quite the disproportionate distaste for him, don’t you?” A statement phrased like a question.

Lucilius’ gaze flicked up toward him slowly as he turned the words over in his mind. “I shouldn't even acknowledge that with a response.” Still, Belial stared expectantly and he found himself distracted from his work. “Why do you think I don’t like something as useless as that thing?” An irate frown tugged at Lucilius’ mouth.

“You know,” Belial’s hands twirled as he extinguished a flame in his palm with a theatrical flourish, “Cifer imparted some bit of wisdom to me over a few drinks.” Lucilius paused in his shuffling, suddenly attentive to the serpent’s twisting words. “He told me that he made dear Sandy in the image of the two beings he felt that he was closest to. The two he calls by ‘friend’. I’m sure you understand who I mean by that.”

“What are you trying to accomplish with this conversation?” The reply snuck out through clenched teeth. A pointless question really, he knew Belial’s tendancies towards instigation. It had been obvious from the start that Lucifer lacked a healthy imagination of his own— both a contradiction to the one named primarch of evolution and a necessary restraint for one intended to be caretaker of a realm. He was intelligent— even more so than Lucilius could have ever hoped him to be, but in the field of creation Lucifer fell short. Sandalphon had been the first and last creature he had tasked him with making.

He had quite literally been formed in Lucilius and Belial’s image. The sharp features, dark hair, and piercing red eyes were an obvious and flattering donation, but from Lucilius’ side that wasn’t the case. Lucifer had committed the same mistake for the spare as Lucilius’ creator had for him. He had gifted him a body that was ill fitting— that was wrong.

“Just a bit of curiosity is all.” The instigator shrugged in feigned innocence. “I thought it was amusing that he considered what we have a friendship. You, on the other hand, seem put off by the notion of having something made in your image, ironic.”

“Lucifer was not made in my image, if that is what you’re implying.” It was an instinctive counter, one that put him on the defensive— a mistake in regards to Belial. Better to backtrack. “You know what it is about him that I despise— back to work.”

Belial had begun to slack in his pace, choosing instead to burn pages one by one as he read over the contents of them. At Lucilius’ prompting, he shrugged and resumed his previous speed. “The body that Lucifer created for him? Not very righteous of you to damn the creation and not the creator.” 

Lucilius scoffed and snatched up another stack of papers to add to Belial’s discard pile, increasing his workload. “It would be foolish of me to debate morality with one who prescribes to no truth but his own. Your jealousy towards Lucifer drives this discussion.”

“Mmm,” a delighted hum rumbled through the primal’s chest as he accepted the documents with outstretched hands, “it’s true, I have my bias but you wound me with such conclusions. By now I’d say you know me intimately enough to know where the fault lies in that statement. Still, is your distaste for the spare really just for Lucifer’s mistake?”

Lucilius’ hands grew still, the papers he’d been sorting forgotten. “No... I couldn’t hate someone for a body they did not choose.” 

At that a smile formed on Belial’s face and he abandoned all pretense of work. “Do tell then, what is it about him that sours your tongue.”

“It’s Lucifer’s infatuation, he spends too much time catering to that creature’s whims.”

“—and not enough time with you?” Belial tacked on slyly earning him a scornful gaze in return. He continued on unperturbed, “But, there it is, the confession. Maybe my jealousy drives this conversation, but yours allows it to take place.” He leaned in, over the desk, pressing into Lucilius’ space. “Not that I’m complaining, I prefer you laid bare before me. Better to love the heart for what it is than pretend it’s something it’s not.”

Lucilius placed his palm against Belial’s cheek and shoved him away with all his might. “You are a contradiction and your attempts at flattery are lacking.”

“A contradiction that loves you.” A deep laugh resounded from Belia’s chest.

“Tomorrow, the world will end by my hand and yet you sit here, idly, choosing to make empty declarations as if there is any future for them.”

“I would spend my last hours no differently if given the chance to do it over again.” A gentle expression began to take shape before Lucilius, one directed at him. 

“So be it then.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was a fic written for Min for our very tiny GBF fic exchange! I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
